The original impetus in creating the first edition of Taking Charge: Your Education, Your Career, Your Life in 2008 was to produce a college success guide that directly linked college success skills to both professional and personal development. That’s especially important with the increasing trend of community and technical college students entering the workforce upon graduation as opposed to immediately moving on to a four-year college. To that end, the writing and research skills of the co-authors, Karen Mitchell Smith and Katharine O’Moore-Klopf, proved to be invaluable through the first two editions of this book.

Since that first edition, however, feedback solicited from instructors around the country combined with advances in digital publishing has resulted in a dramatically revamped third edition to be published in September 2012.

I have heard that phrase countless times, particularly when I was a child. I never understood it, though. When browsing bookstores, I always chose the book whose cover spoke to me most, even spending a touch more on a prettier cover. Most times, my shopping methods work out for me. Sometimes, though, I am duped by clever art directors! (I’m still disgruntled about In The Woods by Tana French.)

What a miraculous idea. Travel across the country in a vehicle reminiscent of a home? The American people have been doing just that since 1910 in recreation vehicles of all different sizes. The year 2010 marked a century of RVing, and the occasion didn’t go unnoticed. The Recreation Vehicle Industry Association (RVIA) dubbed the year the “RV Centennial Celebration,” meant to commemorate the joy people get from RVing.

There is a lot to be said about readers. Those who persist in an understated medium, an art form that may appear to be losing a battle with the distractions of electronic amusement. It is a comforting image: a young person curled up in a chair by the window, sunlight streaming in and illuminating the pages of the book clutched in eager hands. The image celebrates those whose imaginations are still active enough to be able to derive pleasure from words woven to educate, to provoke, or to entertain. That said, I have discovered a new appreciation for those who make books. While I highly uphold writers on a pedestal, people possessing a gift and a passion for stringing together words and birthing new ideas, new worlds, new people; I am speaking instead about book producers. As an intern, my new-found admiration is for book publishers.

TSTC Publishing has added yet another new face to its ranks, Stacie Buterbaugh. Stacie is the new project manager for the company and brings a great deal of experience and hard work to the table. She replaces Grace Arsiaga, who recently left to return to school full-time.

Stacie originally hails from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, but she left her hometown at the age of 19 for Waco, Texas.

Like this:

Creativity is a theme this summer with TSTC Publishing’s design interns. “The graphic design interns we have this summer come from a wide range of backgrounds and experience, but all share a passion for design and a strong work ethic that is vital in today’s job market,” said Projects Manager Grace Arsiaga. “We have had interns working in the office since 2004, when the office first opened, and they are a great asset to the company.”

In her 2005 master’s degree thesis for the American Studies program at Baylor University, Amy Balderach researched and unveiled astounding information about the role prostitution played in Waco’s history. Her essay, “Waco Undressed,” is included as the second chapter in Bradley T. Turner’s book, Lust, Violence, Religion: Life in Historic Waco. The booming cotton and cattle industries in the Deep South during the post-civil war era led to the birth of an area in Waco known as The Reservation. Waco’s red-light district was housed in this two-street region.